Mineral fibers are used in a variety of products. The fibers can be used as reinforcements in products such as plastic matrices, reinforced paper and tape, and woven products. During the fiber forming and collecting process numerous fibers are bundled together as a stand. Several strands can be gathered together to form a roving used to reinforce a plastic matrix to provide structural support to products such as molded plastic products. The strands can also be woven to form a fabric, or can be collected in a random pattern as a fabric. The individual strands are formed from a collection of glass fibers, or can be comprised of fibers of other materials such as other mineral materials or organic polymer materials. A protective coating, or size, is applied to the fibers which allows them to move past each other without breaking when the fibers are collected to form a single strand. The size also improves the bond between the strands and the plastic matrix. The size may also include bonding agents which allow the fibers to stick together, thereby forming an integral strand.
Typically, continuous fibers, such as glass fibers, are mechanically pulled from a feeder of molten glass. The feeder has a bottom plate, or bushing, which has anywhere from 200 to 10,000 orifices. In the forming process, the strand is wound around a rotating drum, or collet, to form, or build, a package. The completed package consists of a single long strand. It is preferable that the package be wound in a manner which enables the strand to be easily unwound, or paid out. It has been found that a winding pattern consisting of a series of helical courses laid on the collet builds a package which can easily be paid out. Such a helical pattern prevents adjacent loops or wraps of strand from fusing together should the strand be still wet from the application of the size material. The helical courses are wound around the collet as the package begins to build. Successive courses are laid on the outer surface of the package, continually increasing the package diameter, until the winding is completed and the package is removed from the collet.
A strand reciprocator guides the strand longitudinally back and forth across the outer surface of the package to lay each successive course. A known strand reciprocator is the spiral wire type strand oscillator. It consists of a rotating shaft containing two outboard wires approximating a spiral configuration. The spiral wires strike the advancing strand and direct it back and forth along the outer surface of the package. The shaft is also moved longitudinally so that the rotating spiral wires are traversed across the package surface to lay the strand on the package surface. While building the package, the spiral wire strand oscillator does not contact the package surface. Although the spiral wire strand oscillator produces a package that can be easily paid out, the package does not have square edges.
A known strand reciprocator which produces square edged, cylindrical packages includes a cam having a helical groove, a cam follower which is disposed within the groove and a strand guide attached to the cam follower. As the cam is rotated, the cam follower and strand guide move the strand longitudinally back and forth across the outer surface of the rotating package to lay each successive course. A rotatable cylindrical member, or roller bail, contacts the outer surface of the package as it is being built to hold the strand laid in the latest course in place at the package edges as the strand guide changes direction. The roller bail is mounted for rotation, and bearings are used to reduce the friction between the roller bail and the mounting surface. The collet and package are rotating at high speeds during winding. The contact between the roller bail and the rotating package surface causes the roller bail to rotate, and the speed of the roller bail surface is generally equal to the high rotational speed of the package surface. The roller bail has a fixed diameter which is generally less than the diameter of the collet, and may be only 10% of the collet diameter. Therefore, the roller bail must rotate at higher revolutions per minute (RPMs) to keep the roller bail surface traveling at the same speed as the speed of the package surface. To operate effectively throughout the preferred range of package sizes and preferred collet speeds during winding the roller bail may have to rotate at 70,000 RPMs or higher.
The rotating rollers of the roller bails contact the strand as it is laid on the package surface. If the speed of the roller bail surface does not match the speed of the package surface, the roller bail will apply abrasive forces against the strand, and this can break some of the fibers in the strand. Bearings are provided between the roller bail mounts and the rotating roller bail to reduce friction and allow the roller bail to rotate at high RPMs. Typical grease lubricated bearings which have been used in the past have been found not to reduce the friction enough to allow the roller bails to operate at such high RPMs without causing abrasive forces against the strand which can break strand fibers. The strand reciprocator has other moving parts in addition to the roller bails with surfaces which need lubrication. The rotating cam has bearings which use lubrication. The cam follower needs lubrication while it moves along the groove on the cam surface.
A known method of lubricating moving parts, including bearings, uses a lubricating fogger to atomize lubrication material to form small, airborne particles of the lubrication material. The lubrication particles are deposited on the bearing surfaces to provide adequate lubrication for operation. The lubrication fogger uses known lubrication materials, such as oil, and other petroleum-based lubricants.
It has been found that using petroleum-based lubricants on the moving parts or surfaces of strand winders is inadequate. Invariably, some of the petroleum-based lubricant makes its way onto the strand being wound by the winder. Unfortunately, the petroleum-based lubricants are not compatible with the size, and they contaminate the strands and interfere with products the strands are used in. For example, fabrics woven from the strands are corinized to burn the size off the fabrics to allow a different coating to be applied. Petroleum-based lubricants on the strands carbonize and discolor the fabrics during corinizing and may even cause holes to be burned in the fabric. Also, contamination of strands used as reinforcing products interferes with the bonding between the strands and the plastic matrices. The problem of contamination of the strand is made worse where a fogger-type lubrication system is used.
It would be desirable to lubricate the moving parts of a strand winder and not contaminate the strands with a lubricant that interferes with the products in which the strands are used. Also, it is desirable to use a lubricant with the lubricating fogger which is compatible with the size and which will not interfere with the products that the strands are used in.